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Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Split personality

Working in a BIM related role will get you develop a split personality.

You constantly alternate between two significantly different roles;

One is a positive character, the innovator, the pioneer, leader and motivator.

The other is the cautious chap, the pragmatic one, providing the voice of reason and forever dragging the chain.

Ironically, those that manage to be good at both roles are often labelled as ‘flip-floppers’, people who can’t quite make up their minds or hold their arguments across the range.

While the spectrum of conflicting traits does not match that of the famous ‘Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ struggle of good and evil, it can be a hard work to deal with this duality daily.

I find the biggest risk in working on an autopilot where I automatically assume the opposite role from whoever I am dealing with, regardless of other circumstances, i.e. shoot down an enthusiastic BIM promoter or try to talk a BIM sceptic around at any cost. I also start my sentences far too often with “Yes, buts”, an impolite habit best to get rid of.

You may say, that the answer is not in developing ‘a split personality’ but a ‘level head’;

That may be healthier for the BIM person and might even be easier to achieve, somehow I don’t think would do a lot of good to BIM.